1,2,3,4Lincoln University College, Malaysia
*Corresponding Author’s Email: poohberry1499@gmail.com
As the living standard and culture of the people are changing, the way of people having lunch in the office is also changing. Some people are bringing lunch-box from their home or order from delivery services. The study aims to investigate the meaning and significance of lunch boxes for Myanmar users and designers in the face of changing habits in food culture. Itis trying to determine the major reasons for using lunch boxes today, and define the users’ needs to know more precisely the relation between the salary and amount spent for lunch and the way they have the lunch about how office workers solve their hunger in everyday life. As the number of office worker is growing up day by day, the market of food supply for them is also growing up. Every employee including young and elder employees must eat their lunch in their working hours to be able to carry out the task the whole day. The type of lunch is differing between them. Types of foods eat by employees varies and it is formally related with the type of religions and type of peoples. Some are vegans and some does not eat specific meat some does not eat seafood. Having a lunch is important for humans and they should eat precisely for their lunch to make them healthier and to increase work done. So that their working life will be easier for everyday as they do not have to take time for preparing lunch box and they can enjoy their extra time from cooking.
Keywords: Lunch Box, Food Culture, Healthy Eating, Young and Active Employees
In the 21st century, ‘Lunch box’ has become more and more important, and today people pay more attention to what they eat and how to eat it. Therefore, the lunch box has once again entered our lives with this new understanding, and the trend of lunch box and the new lifestyle accompanying it underscore this point. According to popular culture and the impact of such movements, Myanmar mobile phone users have begun to share their own lunch and lunch boxes on social media. The design and use of lunch boxes are influenced by these new meanings and values. The main purpose of the study was to investigate the demand for lunch boxes from young and active employees in Myanmar. The study aimed to identify the reasons for using the lunch box and to determine the need for employees to more accurately understand the relationship between the salary and amount spent for lunch and the way they have the lunch, and how office workers can solve their hunger problems in their daily lives. In this way, the research will help to design the literature and bring a new perspective to the designs of the lunchbox for the Myanmar market.
Research Question: To investigate the need of lunch box for the young and active employees in Myanmar.
From the research of the investigation of how the office workers in Myanmar have their lunch, we will know:
The need of lunch box for the employees in Myanmar
The relation between the salary and amount spent for lunch,
The way they have the lunch, and
Especially for starting up the lunch box delivery business for the office workers.
The objectives of the research project are:
To be able to fulfill the need of quality lunch box to the young and active generation of worker
To be able to investigate how the new generation workers have their lunch
To be able to start lunch box delivery service from restaurant
In this survey, the questionnaires to the young and active employees of Myanmar will be asked about the way they handle their lunch.
Since Myanmar has diverse geographical features, favorable seasonal conditions and is naturally endowed with fertile soil and water resources, it boasts an abundant supply of food in a great variety all year around. Myanmar people enjoy rice as their staple food, and it comprises about 75% of the diet. Rice is served with meat or fish, soup, salad and all vegetables all cooked in their own ways, and some relishes to complement the meal. During meal, all the dishes are laid out on the dining table and served together so that diners can make their own choices and combinations. Although the dishes are prepared in variety of ways, the most common method is cooking meat or fish in oil, seasoned with pounded onion, garlic, ginger, turmeric, chili and spices, and simmer until all or until all or most of the water evaporates. The essential and most popular condiment is a kind of relish made from preserved fish or prawn, served with chili powder.
Most traditional snacks, which are rich in variety and taste, are generally made with rice or glutinous rice. And La-Phet or pickled tea leaves with a dash of oil and sesame seeds, fried garlic and roasted peanuts, is another popular snack typical of Myanmar. Officially there are more than 135 different ethnic groups in Myanmar, each with its own history, culture and language. That make Myanmar food vary and tasty as other cuisines in the world (Oxford Burma Alliance).
Yangon is the second capital of Myanmar, but it is still a business capital. And, according to the characteristic of a business capital, Yangon, the metropolitan city of Myanmar, has all the
ethnics from the whole country who want to make their fortune. Some are living alone in places like hostel and tiny room while some people are living together with the family and friends in big houses and apartments. When these people are going to work, the one who live with the family or many friends usually have chance to bring lunch box to work. During lunch time at the job, all the fellow-workers usually have lunch together at canteen or designated area, while sharing each other’s curry or dishes. Unlike the lunch box from bread- eating countries, and other Asian countries, Myanmar has unique style of lunch box culture. In European countries and bread – eating countries, people usually make different kinds of sandwich for the lunch and in Mediterranean countries, people eat different pasta and pizzas. In most of the Asian countries, people eat noodle, flour-based foods, and rice also. The lunch box in those countries is usually fried rice, fried noodles and vermicelli, and sometimes bread too. But in Myanmar, people only eat rice mostly for all meals and every day together with other curry and dishes. According to statistics, an average person in Myanmar eats more than 200kg of rice per annum, which is the biggest consumption per person in the world.
Young employees are the peoples mostly from the age group between 25 to 18 years as under18s cannot be employed on construction sites or some other work places or because of work experiences. Although the job positions are varying among the young employees, most of them have basic positions at the work because of their age and working experiences. When salaries are compared to the elder employees, most young employees got lessen and there is only a little amount or limited cash of having chance to have their lunch in the office.
Most young employees came from the background of schools and colleges and some of them have the habit of carrying lunch boxes to work as they carried lunch boxes to schools, and it is the easier and suitable way for them. Some employees cannot carry the lunch to work as they have no time or no people to prepare their lunch boxes or they are more preferred to eat outside of the office. But, in the strict work places, they do not possess enough time to have their lunch outside and they must rely on the budget lunch box delivery services to be able to have their lunch instantly. Young employees can work more than elder employees as they are youth, active and motivated and more energy is consumed, and it can be said that young employees eat more than elder employees.
Employee including young and elder employees must eat their lunch in their working hours to be able to carry out the task the whole day. Buying style and type of lunch are differing between them. Types of foods eaten by employees varies and it is formally related with the type of religions and type of peoples. Some are vegans and some does not eat specific meat, and some does not eat seafood.
Some employees eat their lunch in the canteen by ordering foods or carrying their lunch box. But most young employees like office workers usually eat their lunch in the same place as they work and most of them are facing with the sad desk lunch and some of them lose their pant sizes because of fatty lunch. Having a lunch is important for humans and they should eat
precisely for their lunch to make them healthier and to increase work done. And some of them are eating the readymade food and snacks. To avoid these problems, some employees and offices are relied on the lunch box delivery services. Workers are not cat they are the peoples who are important for the industry and offices and they should eat healthy foods instead of junk food (Biltekoff, 2010). The current Finnish dietary guidelines on recommended food intake were used to assess recommended food habits. Based on these national guidelines, three separate indicators of recommended food habits were constructed from the food frequency inventory: eating vegetables more than once daily, eating fish at least twice a week and a summary index of recommended food habits (Mechlem, 2004). The frequency of use during one month of cooked and fresh vegetables was summed up and if the frequency sum exceeds 43 times per month, the respondent was classified as having vegetables more than once daily (Helsinki, 1998).
Since the study was based on data of employees, we also wanted to consider work-related factors that could possibly determine lunch pattern or food habits. If a person has a limited amount of time at work, he/she may eat a packed lunch instead of going to the canteen. (Roos, Lähteenkorava & Lallukka, 2013)
The primary research method will be mainly used in the project. Primary research involves collecting data about a given subject directly from the real world. Collecting data from the young and active office workers, client/ guest/ customers of the restaurant is primary research method and we can know the updated data and information instead of using the secondary data. In primary research, the area discovered will be discussed in the Survey Questions. The survey will be carried out to the young office workers who are under 25 years old, working in Yangon.
Both qualitative and quantitative data will be used in this survey as we need some questionnaires such as the feeling about the lunch box delivery service as qualitative data while the money spent on lunch, the salary income of the employee as quantitative data.
We will collect all these data from primary sources such as employees from service office buildings, office apartments and the customers from restaurants. And, convenient sampling method will be used as it is a non-probability sampling technique where subjects are selected because of the convenient accessibility and proximity to the researcher.
While considering the sample size, the following factors are being considered. Population size: According to the latest data, Yangon is the second capital of Myanmar. Yangon has population of 10 million people. The number of young and active employees will be estimated as 20000 people. According to the calculations, the sample size we need to take survey is 200 people who are within the frame.
There are several reasons why it is important to adhere to ethical norms in research. And by given the importance of ethics for the conduct of research, it should come as no surprise that many different professional associations, government agencies, and universities have adopted specific codes, rules, and policies relating to research ethics.
The following is a rough and general summary of some ethical principal that various codes address.
The study aims to determine the major reasons for using lunch boxes today, and define the users’ needs to know more precisely the relation between the salary and amount spent for lunch and the way they have the lunch about how office workers solve their hunger in everyday life. The main findings in this study are the following. About half of those with employees at their workplace had their lunch at there. Those with higher educational level, women with pre-school children and men with normal weight were more likely to have lunch
at workplace (Pontes et al., 2009). Those who had lunch at workplace were more likely to follow recommended food habits compared with others. So that their working life will be easier for everyday as they do not have to take time for preparing lunch box and they can enjoy their extra time from cooking (Karrebaek, 2012).
There are some limitations when the research is made. Some people do not provide accurate information, and some people do not have ethics to answer the correct answer. Moreover, there are information that cannot be displayed officially by organizations are the factors that are limitations for the research. The surveyors do not ethic and cannot rely on them as they can act dishonestly on the survey they made. Also, the time is the limitation for the research, it cannot be said that the all survey can be carried out in the fixed schedule. So that all the needs of the employee can’t be found out in a short period. So, this research is based on literature review related conference, journal, website books of human resource management in Myanmar. Therefore, this research fills the technical need of lunch box for the young and active employees in Myanmar.
This study showed that having lunch at workplace is associated with the quality of the diet. To serve a cooked meal including vegetables during working time may be an efficient way to improve diet among adult employees. More emphasis should be put on increasing the possibility for the young and active employees to have lunch at a workplace in Myanmar.
Biltekoff, C. (2010). Consumer Response: The Paradoxes of Food and Health, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1190(1), pp 174-178.
Helsinki. (1998). National Nutrition Council. Public Health Nutrition, 7(1), pp 53-66.
Karrebaek, M.S. (2012). What’s in Your Lunch Box Today? Health Respectability and Ethnicity in the Primary Classroom. Journal of Linguistic Anthropology, 22(1), pp 1-22.
Mechlem, K. (2004). Food Security and the Right to Food in the Discourse of the United Nations. European Law Journal, 10(5), pp 631-48.
Oxford Burma Alliance. Retrieved From: http://www.oxfordburmaalliance.org/ethnic- groups.html
Pontes, T.E., Costa, T.F., Marum, A.B., Brasil, A.L. & Taddei, J.A. (2009). Nutritional Guidance for Children and Adolescents and the New Consumption Patterns: Advertising, Packaging and Labeling. Revista Paulista de Pediatria, 27(1), pp 99-105.
David, B. & Resnik, J.D. (2015). What is Ethics in Research & Why it Important? Retrieved From: https://www.niehs.nih.gov/research/resources/bioethics/whatis/index.cfm
Roos, E., Lähteenkorava, S.S., & Lallukka, T. (2013). Having lunch at a staff canteen is associated with recommended food habits. Public Health Nutrition, 7(1), pp 53-61.